The Buzz: EDC, hair salon vying for former Redding tourism building

The Shasta County EDC wants to move closer to downtown Redding. Meanwhile, Woody's Brewing will start putting its beers in cans, which means more local beer coming to market. It's in this week's "Buzz."
Wochit

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You also can call him at 530-225-8219 or email him at david.benda@redding.com.(Photo: Dave Benda)

The Redding Chamber of Commerce, ironically, relocated from a different building on Auditorium Drive to the White Building downtown last year. Local investors Luke Miner and Eric Hiatt are redeveloping 1525 Pine St., across from the Chamber, into what I hear is co-working and small office space.

Work on K2’s $38 million, mixed-use complex on the site of the former Dicker’s building has started.

And the McConnell Foundation and K2 should find out later this month if they got a $20 million state grant so they can move forward on plans to redevelop the California Street parking garage property.

What happens if the EDC loses out on the Auditorium Drive building?

“There are other buildings, but here’s the deal, every other building requires more (tenant improvements) than we want or is bigger than we want,” Giovaniello said.

For the record, the Shasta Venture Hub, a business incubator created by the EDC, isn’t going away. It would continue to operate without the EDC as a tenant.

A phone message left with the owners of Boheme had not been returned by Friday afternoon.

Woody’s coming to market

If you follow Woody’s Brewing on Facebook, you know the downtown Redding business recently purchased a canning system.

“Where do you want to see Woody’s for sale? Tell us in the comment section below,” the brewery posted.

Co-owner Scott Wlodarczyk told me the plan is to have four- and six-packs of Woody’s cans on store shelves this summer. Woody’s is run by the family team of Scott, his son, Andrew Wlodarczyk, and Scott’s brother, Patrick Wlodarczyk.

“We will put the lighter style in the 12-ounce cans and the bigger styles (i.e. more alcohol content) in the 16-ounce cans,” Wlodarczyk said.

Of course, the 12-ounce cans will be available in six-packs, the 16-ounce in four-packs.

Wlodarczyk said they are not ready to announce which stores the cans will be available in.

Stay tuned.

Habitat website gone

Habitat for Humanity Shasta Cascade has pulled the plug on its website.

The board voted to end its affiliation with the international organization last month.

That decision came after a Record Searchlight story in March reported that Habitat for Humanity Shasta Cascade and its sister organization, Innovations Housing, haven’t built any affordable housing since 2011.

Two local organizations want to restart the chapter: the California Heritage YouthBuild Academy and AccessHome have expressed interest in establishing an affiliate. The former is a charter school, the latter, a nonprofit that provides housing to people with developmental disabilities.

Meanwhile, Innovations Housing’s annual raffle has sold 1,900 tickets at $100 apiece, and the drawing is scheduled to go off Aug. 31, per a marketing email sent to potential ticket buyers on the nonprofit’s mailing list.

The charity raffle has drawn scrutiny after a Record Searchlight investigation last month raised questions about Innovations Housing’s compliance with state laws that govern how raffle proceeds are to be used for charitable purposes.

Reporter David Benda can be reached at 225-8219 or david.benda@redding.com. Follow him on Twitter @DavidBenda_RS.